Lindsey Graham Says Trump Isn’t ‘Crazy’ But Rather A Political Strategist

South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham wants everyone to know there is “nothing crazy” about President Donald Trump’s recent set of… well… crazy tweets.

During an appearance on MSNBC’s Hugh Hewitt Show, Graham said that Trump was “not the first president to use the bully pulpit to try to push the country in a particular direction.”

Graham’s comments arrived shortly after Trump was criticized by nearly all sides for his response to the violence that broke out when white nationalists violently marched on Charlottesville, Virginia. Trump followed up those comments with a meme of himself “eclipsing” President Barack Obama before increasing troop levels for the US military presence in Afghanistan after spending more than a year criticizing troop levels overseas while campaigning to become the 45th POTUS.

Graham admits that Trump went a bit “nuts” in his Charlottesville comments but called his Afghanistan speech “excellent.” He then claimed that Trump’s behavior is a strategic play to win favor with Republicans while moving forward with his own agenda.

“The rally is Donald Trump going back to base politics, firing up his base to create political pressure and to keep his people on board for his agenda,” Graham told MSNBC. “So it’s not irrational.”

“There’s nothing unhinged about it, it’s a political strategy that I’m not so sure is smart, but it’s a very thought-out strategy,” Graham added.

Graham has been a vocal conservative critic of Donald Trump’s. He even told the story about the time Trump called him in the middle of the night because the President was featured on MSNBC.

“And I said Mr. President, you’re watching MSNBC at 11:00. If you stop watching it, their audience goes down by half.”